Today we help a co-worker decide between carriers, receive some mail, re-evaluate our cell service, and have a guest!
This past week I was approached by a co-worker who was asking my thoughts on switching from their current provider to something else. They currently have Verizon and were looking at switching to AT&T due to the fact that we receive an employee discount where we work. So I ran the numbers: for them it will be a better deal than they currently pay Verizon but the better deal is yet to be had. They would have to buy a new phone as their Verizon phone is not compatible with AT&T service. So any savings go out the window. The best bet for them is to go with Straight Talk for $45/month unlimited (in our area tax and all brings it to $49.27/month with the $1 auto pay discount) and be able to use their current phone on that. This would be a huge savings for them as no new phone would have to be purchased.
Also this week I received a flyer for the new AT&T GoPhone plans. They claim you can save “Up to $600/year” with their multi-line discounts. After running the numbers you could get 5 lines with unlimited talk/text and 4GB data for right at $34/line/month + taxes. This is not bad if you have a need for 5 lines. I only need 2 though.
It is about that time that I re-evaluate our cellphone plans so I took a look at the AT&T post-paid plans and what I could save with my discount.
- First on the post-paid AT&T: 2 lines with 10GB data shared would run $80 for the data and $20 per line “access fee”. So $120 before any taxes or discounts. My discount is 17% or $20.40 off the $120. This is before any taxes. Currently I pay $98.54 for both of our lines with Straight Talk. The AT&T post-paid is $99.60 BEFORE taxes so is already more than I pay now.
- Now looking at the GoPhone part: 2 lines with unlimited talk/text and 4GB data each (no pool but they do each have rollover data) for $80/month before taxes. This is not bad as I typically only use 2.5GB on my phone and my wife usually stays around 3 or 3.5GB. Also with the new GoPhone plans they don’t just cut you off after the data is used, they just throttle you. This is the same behavior as Straight Talk after the 5GB limit. The difference here is GoPhone allows WiFi hotspot/tethering on their plans. Straight Talk does not do this officially.
In the end I think we will be trying the GoPhone plan. This is the beauty of not being in a contract, you can change providers whenever you want! If it turns out the GoPhone service does not work out for us then we can always go back to Straight Talk. It always pays to shop around. On cell service I like to do it at least every 3 months. I know you are asking…But how do you keep your phone number the same if you change carriers often. That is for another post.
Until next time
